NASASpaceFlight.com has a lengthy story about the people behind DIRECT, a shuttle-derived heavy lift vehicle that they have been pushing NASA to develop:

The Direct movement â€“ a group of professionals and non-professional engineers that created an architecture alternative to Constellationâ€™s Ares vehicles â€“ are ready to transition their movement, following the redirection of NASAâ€™s future by lawmakers, which calls for a Space Launch System (SLS) based around a Shuttle Derived (SD) Heavy Lift Launch Vehicle (HLV), which they feel justifies their four years of work.

Their work in promoting this idea has been impressive, given the criticism and outright scorn they received over the years. I’ve always eyed it a bit wearily. It sounds logical enough — all the elements are there in some form or another and most have been flown. But, that was the whole point behind Ares I and V. That didn’t work out very well, largely because adapting the technology cost as much or more than building something new from scratch. The DIRECT supporters say this design is different, but I’m not entirely convinced.

My other main concern is operating costs with anything that is shuttle derived. The entire shuttle program has been a story of the cost of getting into orbit being so expensive that we’ve been limited in what we can do there. Thirty years and we’ve got one space station with six people on it. That had a lot to do with the cost of building, operating and maintaining the shuttle system, and the small army of people needed to do it. DIRECT will probably be a bit better in the sense that we’re not lugging any entire shuttle into orbit that has to be returned to Earth with the crew safely intact. But still, I wonder if this is the right way to go. And what NASA will recommend after it finishes the current study on HLV.

NASA: Change of heart on new rocket that would reuse shuttle parts?Orlando Sentinel

Dozens of Kennedy Space Center engineers and more at other NASA centers have been working quietly behind the scenes since August to design a new rocket made from parts of the space shuttle â€” a project similar to one that an agency official only two years ago said defied the laws of physics.

The design uses most of the existing shuttle hardware, including its current four-segment solid rocket boosters, the big orange external fuel tank and versions of the shuttle’s main engines. The plan puts the engines underneath the tank, with the boosters on the sides and a capsule on top, to create a launcher capable of lifting 70 tons into orbit, more than enough to blast four or more astronauts and their gear into space.

The engineers’ aim is a test flight by 2014 and a fully operational rocket able to take cargo â€” and possibly crew â€” to the International Space Station by 2016.

The rocket is almost identical to one promoted for the past four years by Team Direct, a group of moonlighting NASA engineers and rocket hobbyists. The group touted its project as a more viable and cheaper alternative to the agency’s expensive and troubled Constellation moon program and its family of Ares rockets.

NASASpaceFlight.com is reporting that NASA could conduct a test flight of a heavy-lift rocket as early as late 2012:

The Michoud Assembly Facility (MAF) have confirmed they have almost enough External Tank resources to allow for one ET-sized â€œIn Lineâ€ Shuttle Derived Heavy Launch Vehicle (SD HLV) test flight and up to three Block I SD HLVs. The news comes as NASA managers insist the workforce should wait for official news, and not to be distracted by reports on Aresâ€™ demise.

The SD HLV would be along the lines of the proposed Jupiter Direct, a rocket proposed by a group of dissident NASA engineers who were unhappy with the space agency’s Ares I and V programs.

…several NASA departments [are] already carrying out evaluations on one of the major elements of the likely future path for NASA â€“ moving away from Low Earth Orbit (LEO) based around the development of a Heavy Lift Launch Vehicle.

While Ares Iâ€™s role for International Space Station (ISS) missions heads to a commercial service provider, the HLV will be contracted out â€“ not unlike NASA already does to some extent with the shuttle â€“ moving to a multi-company effort led by Boeing, partnering with Alliant Techsystems, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne and United Space Alliance (USA), with heavy NASA involvement from Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC)….

Even the long-time Constellation supporter, Senator Richard Shelby (R-AL) is understood to be supportive of this alternate plan, along with many of his colleagues.

When the e-mail from Doug Cooke, head of NASA’s Constellation program, blinked onto Ross Tierney’s computer screen a few weeks ago, he bolted upright. The two men sit on opposite ends of the debate over the future of NASA’s human spaceflight program, and the outreach signaled that something peculiar was happening in Washington, D.C.

Tierney, an amateur space buff, is an outspoken advocate for Jupiter Direct, a rocket designed to replace NASA’s Ares 1 and Ares V, the two launch vehicles at the heart of NASA’s Constellation program. This Bush-era program aims to bring supplies and crew to the International Space Station and, later, to the moon. Cooke’s e-mail invited Tierney to make a presentation about the Direct rocket, which was developed by a rebel group of moonlighting NASA engineers disgruntled with the Ares 1.

Little more than a week later, anonymous Obama administration officials told reporters that NASA is set to ditch the Ares 1 and V by cutting all funding for the program from the budget. Insiders now tell PM that the two launch systems will eventually be replaced by a single shuttle-stack heavy-lift rocket that could be similar to the Direct proposal. That rocket relied heavily on components from the space shuttle and Ares, with the shuttle’s external fuel tank serving as the body of the main rocket. Two five-segment versions of the shuttle’s solid-rocket boostersâ€”currently under development as the first stage of the Ares 1â€”would help provide the initial oomph. In single-stage form, such a new rocket could lift 100 metric tons into low Earth orbit, making it a more capable space-station taxi than the private rockets being developed under NASA’s initiatives to fill the post-shuttle gap. Fitted with a second stage, the new rocket would also be able to launch robot probes and astronauts toward whatever deep-space target NASA chooses in the post-Constellation era.

NASA Administrator Charlie Bolden has asked for a â€œSpecial Teamâ€ at the Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) to evaluate the Heavy Lift alternatives â€“ including DIRECTâ€™s Jupiter launch vehicle â€“ as a â€œtop priorityâ€. The team has been asked to create a report on their findings in time for Thanksgiving, in an apparent reaction to the final Augustine Commission report â€“ which will be published on Thursday.

The Space Shuttle Program (SSP) is coming to the end of an evaluation phase on the â€œcurrently favoredâ€ Heavy Lift Vehicle (HLV) â€“ otherwise known as the Shuttle Derived Heavy Lift Launch Vehicle (SD HLLV), as they move into a consultation period with the Constellation Program (CxP).

The vehicle, side mounted to the current design of the External Tank, is a true Shuttle Derived concept, with heritage from a previous concept known as Shuttle-C. The concept is capable of launching 80mt (metric tons) into Low Earth Orbit (LEO) and around 54mt to the moon.

Over the past couple of months, numerous status reports have been posted on the Shuttle Standup/Integration reports â€“ which SSP use to bring the teams up to date on vehicle and program status. The vast majority of updates have been positive, as the well-oiled Shuttle teams took a deeper look into the concept at the request of the Augustine Commission.

]]>http://www.parabolicarc.com/2009/10/27/nasa-studying-heavy-lift-rockets/feed/0Interview with Ross Tierney of DIRECThttp://www.parabolicarc.com/2009/07/26/interview-ross-tierney-direct/
http://www.parabolicarc.com/2009/07/26/interview-ross-tierney-direct/#commentsSun, 26 Jul 2009 21:05:40 +0000http://www.parabolicarc.com/?p=7343Next Big Future has an interview with Ross Tierney, who heads up a group that is promoting its DIRECT launcher as an alternative to NASA’s Constellation architecture. An excerpt:

Question: If the Jupiter rocket scheme is accepted and properly funded, how will it affect space exploration during the next decade?

Answer: I see a major revolution in the space exploration industry. We could begin to explore the solar system in a serious manner. We will be able to launch massive payloads into orbit. Missions to the moon and near-earth objects will become feasible. We will also be able to lay the groundwork for missions to Phobos and Mars. It might take 20-30 years, but it will happen. This marks a radical change from the Shuttle era, when we were limited to taking extremely expensive trips to low-earth orbit. This truly represents a once-in-a-generation opportunity to jump-start a new ear of exploration and eventual colonization of our solar system.

Read the full interview. http://nextbigfuture.com/2009/07/interview-with-ross-tierney-of-direct.html

]]>http://www.parabolicarc.com/2009/07/26/interview-ross-tierney-direct/feed/0And the Winner is….http://www.parabolicarc.com/2009/07/15/winner/
http://www.parabolicarc.com/2009/07/15/winner/#commentsWed, 15 Jul 2009 07:47:10 +0000http://www.parabolicarc.com/?p=6688Our poll of which rocket NASA should use is complete, and it looks like those anonymous rebel NASA engineers will be celebrating wherever they happen to actually work. The final vote tallies are:

They have deemed some of these projects worthy of further study, including ideas written off by NASA engineers a few years ago as being underpowered, unsafe and unimaginative. One of them is being promoted by the head of NASA’s shuttle program. Another is the product of a group of freelance engineers â€” some of them NASA employees working on their own time â€” and rocket hobbyists calling themselves the Direct team.

Last week, the committee said it wants Aerospace Corp., an independent-research group, to analyze Direct’s Jupiter rocket, which would use the shuttle’s giant external fuel tank and two solid rocket boosters to launch a capsule instead of an orbiter.

“This should show our detractors that we can’t be dismissed as a bunch of people in tinfoil hats,” said Stephen Metschan, who leads Direct.

]]>http://www.parabolicarc.com/2009/06/25/direct-alternative-nasas-ares-architecture/feed/0DIRECT Team Disputes NASA Analysis of Ares Alternativehttp://www.parabolicarc.com/2009/05/18/direct-team-disputes-nasa-analysis-ares-alternative/
http://www.parabolicarc.com/2009/05/18/direct-team-disputes-nasa-analysis-ares-alternative/#commentsMon, 18 May 2009 21:31:30 +0000http://www.parabolicarc.com/?p=4587The DIRECT group – which is promoting an alternative lunar architecture to NASA’s Ares program – has issued a report criticizing the space agency’s critique of its rocket design as inadequate.

DIRECT’s 115-page PowerPoint response claims that NASA’s October 2007 review of the proposed Jupiter launch system included “significant flaws in the evaluation of DIRECT that set up a scenario where DIRECT would inevitably look inferior when compared to Ares.

“The errors are so numerous that the only conclusion possible is that this document cannot be used to properly assess the value of the DIRECT alternative,” the document says.

These significant errors, misinterpretations, insertions and deletions, incorrect assumptions and the resulting skewing of the DIRECT architecture components are apparent throughout the October 2007 analysis document. These include but are not limited to:

Clearly identified design criteria, which fundamentally define DIRECT, were replaced with alternative options known to have sub par performance.

Cost criticisms were focused on very narrow bands of expenditures and pointedly excluded the most substantial areas, such as development costs.

The analysis ignores the fact that Jupiter is a single vehicle flying in two flight configurations and instead evaluates DIRECT as if it were two independent designs.

The analysis misappropriated the range of options the DIRECT architecture makes possible, such as the use of orbital Propellant Depots and EML staging, and applied them as if they were baseline criteria.

The analysis understates the logistical and infrastructure requirements of a full VSE lunar program in order to avoid comparing DIRECT to Ares.

The Launch Vehicle that was the subject of the analysis, while referred to throughout as DIRECTâ€™s Jupiter launch vehicle, was in fact nothing of the kind. It resembled the Jupiter but the design did not conform to the fundamental design parameters of DIRECTâ€™s Jupiter Launch Vehicle. It was this vehicle that was analyzed, not DIRECTâ€™s Jupiter.

The DIRECT organization was never contacted to discuss this analysis, to fact check any items or criteria used to inform the analysis or to clarify any of the supposed issues.

Once completed, the analysis was published throughout NASA and its contractor force, without any peer review.

The very existence of the analysis was kept secret for a year, with NASA acknowledging it only when forced to by having its existence revealed by an outside journalist.

Shortly before going to release, the DIRECT Team has learned that NASA managers are being instructed to familiarize themselves with this 2007 Analysis document and to be prepared to use it as talking points to defend the Ares project against DIRECT.

This last point makes it imperative that we provide this point-by-point rebuttal so that the facts are able to stand on their own and speak for themselves, free of the many significant errors identified in NASAâ€™s Analysis of DIRECT.

“The reason we have to be unnamed is NASA has a reputation for making life miserable for anyone who’s working on [DIRECT],” said an engineer who works at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida and asked not to be identified. “Quite a few have been transferred to undesirable locations.”

NASA denies taking punitive action against DIRECT project participants. “What they do in their own time is their business,” said agency spokesman Grey Hautaluoma.

So far, reception to their ideas from political decision-makers has been less than enthusiastic. Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., who chairs the Senate Subcommittee on Science and Space, “sees no reason to second-guess NASA’s own experts,” his office said.

A White House spokesman said the Obama administration would not comment on Constellation and the alternative proposed by DIRECT until it names a replacement for former NASA Administrator Michael Griffin, who stepped down in January.

NASA has released the schedule for its remaining ten space shuttle missions. The plan includes nine flights to the International Space Station and a Hubble servicing mission in October. Endeavour is set to close out the shuttle era beginning on May 31, 2010 – about 10 months short of the 30th anniversary of the program’s inaugural mission on April 12, 1981.

Meanwhile, NASA has ramped work on the shuttle’s successor, Constellation. In lieu of actual test flights (which won’t begin until next year), the space agency has created a really snazzy video showing how Constellation will place us on a path back to the moon beginning in 2013….or 2015.

And how is work going on the Ares rockets and Orion capsule? Officially, everything’s coming up Milhouse. In fact, you can read about how well things are going on NASA’s official Constellation website. Or read this story about Ares in the Houston Chronicle.

Others aren’t so sure.

The anonymous author of the insider Rocketsandsuch blog – who regularly refers to NASA Administrator Mike Griffin as “The Emperor” – says that the shuttle-derived Ares 1 vehicle is so troubled that NASA will likely cancel it. The author also doesn’t think too highly of the larger Ares 5 booster, which probably should be called Ares 6 because of the additional engine it now requires.

Some people wouldn’t be sad to see the Ares program canceled. A group of engineers have been promoting their own shuttle-derived launcher called DIRECT, a.k.a. Jupiter. They think it would be a much more efficient way of send humans back to the moon.

NASA begs to differ. Last week, the space agency released the results of a study conducted by the Marshall Space Flight Center that indicates DIRECT would be much, much worse than the Ares rockets. Insufficient payload, higher costs, cryogenic refueling on orbit, the list goes on. Wired Science has a summary. Or you can read NASA’s White Paper or longer Technical Assessment.

NASA’s analysis has prompted a response from DIRECT team member Chuck Longton. Rob Coppinger has Longton’s objections to NASA’s critique over on the Hyperbola blog.

FWIW, Mr. Rocketsandsuch also doesn’t think it’s a very good idea, either. “And yet, like every other half-baked idea, the Jupiter concept is yet another answer to the wrong question,” the anonymous blogger opined.

So, you’re probably wondering: Where does this leave us? I really have no idea. My guess is that NASA will continue on along its current path for most of the next year. Then whoever is president will have to determine where the program is and what to do about it. All I can say is: Good luck. He’s probably going to need it.